A Fistful of Dollars at 50: The Impact of Spaghetti Westerns

Nobody expected much of Sergio Leone’s 1964 Italian Western A Fistful of Dollars – not even its young American star, Clint Eastwood, who saw the project as a European vacation from his American TV series, Rawhide.

Bill Shaffer explores how the film became an international success, turning Eastwood into a major movie star and kicking off two decades of European-made “spaghetti” Westerns.

Shaffer grew up in Hutchinson, Kansas, where his father managed the historic Fox Theatre. Since 1978 he has been a producer/director for KTWU, the public television station in Topeka, Kansas.